One of the first games to launch on the App Store in 2008, the original Fieldrunners was a giant hit and a harbinger of the tower defense surge that followed. The team at Subatomic has upgraded the original game continually since then, adding sound, music, and levels. But now it’s time for a huge leap forward for the franchise: an awesomely upgraded Fieldrunners 2.

The first thing you’ll notice are the updated graphics. The adorable and highly recognizable character designs are back, but the levels are much richer in detail. Levels now include special terrain like bridges, elevated platforms, and traps, such as red hot coils to burn up enemy foot soldiers.

The level design in Fieldrunners 2 has been carefully considered as well. Subatomic told us they are taking a Mario and Zelda-like approach to the design, with collectible stars to unlock new levels, and a careful balance between action and puzzles. For example, bonus levels will place the enemy’s exit just a few feet from the entrance, forcing you to construct a spiral of machine gun towers to keep them from escaping. In another, you have to place just one or two towers to change the enemy’s trajectory and force them through a lethal force field.

Fieldrunners 2 is also avoiding some of the traps of other tower defense games. It won’t have in-app puchases at launch– all of your upgrades have to be earned through gameplay. And Subatomic has included clever new towers beyond the standard machine guns and rocket launchers. Our favorite is a mine-laying tower that pops out explosives on a slow but steady basis, which is perfect for a last line of defense.

Even if you think you’ve had enough of tower defense, Fieldrunners 2 is well worth a look. It looks great, has a promising amount of level variety, and offers some clever innovations for the genre. It’ll be available in an iPhone version by the end of June, with the iPad version to follow about a month later.

Every year at E3, we keep ourselves busy with hands-on previews and developer interviews for the latest iOS games. But we always try to make time to check out the latest iOS-like consoles from Nintendo, Sony, and Microsoft. Two years ago, we tried out the 3DS to see if 3D mobile gaming would take off, and last year, we put the PSP Vita through its paces. This year, the most iOS-like console at E3 is Nintendo’s Wii U, so we took it for a test drive to see if its touchscreen controller can compare with the best of iPad gaming. (more…)

Talk about a big week! iOS was more present than ever at this year’s E3, and we have the stories to prove it. Read on for samples of all of our coverage of the biggest gaming event of the year, with links to the full articles. (more…)

Whether Americans want to acknowledge it or not, the biggest sport in the world is soccer. Whenever EA Sports drops a new FIFA title, it’s a big deal, a worldwide event. Naturally, we were curious to see how FIFA 13 on iOS was coming along. With a Fall release, the development window is closing soon. Check out our impressions from the E3 build shown behind closed doors. (more…)

Ever hear of a fun little indie game called Zombie Highway? Well, so has Glu Mobile. Glu is borrowing (okay, outright stealing) this concept and putting their own mark on it, launching it under the name Mutant Roadkill. And while we like the new additions, we can’t help but feel they’re being shameless in repurposing someone else’s good idea. (more…)

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The fine folks at Milkbag games have released Sidewords. A fun little diversion of a word game that is the devil child of crosswords and scrabble. For each level in the game the grid must be completed to win the level — this means that each letter at the top and side must be used. And not just the top or side, but each word must be made up of letters from the top and side to create a grid. It’s a pain, but in the right kind of way. Even the simplest of the levels can be a head scratcher until you get used to the game. Well worth the $3 as a diversion while we wait for Milkbag to finally release Snow Siege.

We’d like to thank our sponsor for this week, Zap Zap Kindergarten Math.

It’s not always easy to tear your kids away from their tablets and make them do something edifying. Thankfully, Zap Zap Kindergarten Math relieves you of this task by turning mathematics into a fun touchscreen video game. Win win!

Aimed at children 3-6 years old, the app makes math fun by ‘gamifying’ it, turning simple mathematics problems into little challenges so that your pre-schooler can learn and play at the same time.

There are more than two dozen mini-games, split across three categories: Numbers, Shapes and Measurements, and Add and Subtract. According to the developer the difficulty of these puzzles is adaptive too, so kids of any ability can be both encouraged and challenged.

Mini Dayz has launched and it’s a pixelated 2.5D open world that’s as brutal as the desktop version. In this game, the player is dumped on shore with nothing. They must scavenge around for food, water, and weapons while avoiding attack. It’s the kind of game where the goal is to stay alive as long as possible. But that will never be very long. It’s oddly free and seems to only have an ad on the main screen — for now.

Pewter Games has brought their charming point and click adventure The Little Acre to iOS. It’s an amazingly beautiful animated adventure set in a sort of hybrid magical / alien world. A great all ages adventure and very fun.

We’d like to thank our sponsor for this week, The House of Da Vinci by Blue Brain Games. There’s a reason Leonardo Da Vinci is the only renaissance figure who routinely shows up in video games you know. With his remarkable inventiveness and genius for creative problem-solving, Da Vinci was a gamer through and through. He was just born 500 hundred years too soon. Thankfully, there are studios like Blue Brain Games to bring him to life in videogame form. The House of Da Vinci, which comes to us courtesy of a hugely successful Kickstarter campaign, is a puzzler that seeks to channel the artistry and innovation of its title character.

You play as one of Da Vinci’s more promising apprentices, and you have the challenging task of trying to work out where the hell he’s gone. Was he assassinated by the church? Who knows. Has he quietly gone into a retirement? Perhaps. Did he accidentally invent a shrink ray and shrink himself down to the size of an dustmite? Probably not. Da Vinci’s workshop looks beautiful, thanks to some impressive 3D graphics, and the in-game environment is crammed with all the elaborate machines and crazy inventions you’d expect to find in the workplace of a renaissance genius.(more…)

Poly Bridge is out now on iOS, and it’s good to have it! It’s a great game and many seem to agree that it’s the best bridge builder game available. But the iOS versions, so far, is missing the sandbox mode. I would hope that it’s coming soon in an update. If you are all interested in physics puzzlers, grab this one. (Note: the video is for the PC version, I have yet to see a trailer for the mobile version, the developer Dry Cactus isn’t that great at marketing…)

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